This invention relates to the manufacture of metallic strip and more particularly to an apparatus and method for integrated, continuous, high speed manufacture of finished metallic strip from a metallic melt.
It is well known in the art to cast indefinite lengths of metallic rods or strands from a melt by drawing the melt through a cooled mold. Known casting techniques include down-casting, horizontal or inclined casting and upcasting. The above referenced application Ser. No. 928,881 discloses a mold assembly and method for the continuous up-casting of high quality metallic rods, particularly those of copper and copper alloys including brass, at production speeds many times faster than those previously attainable with closed mold systems.
It is known to oscillate a continuous casting mold to provide stripping action to facilitate the movement of the newly cast rod through the mold and more importantly, when the rate of advancement of the mold during a portion of the cycle is greater than that of the rod being cast, to prevent tension tears in the solidifying skin. To produce high quality rod, it is necessary that mold motion be substantially parallel to the direction of travel of the rod through the mold. Moreover, creating the casting strokes by mold oscillation allows the rod to be withdrawn from the mold at a constant rate, thereby facilitating further processing operations after casting, for example, the conversion of rod to strip. The rolling mills for such a conversion from rod to strip require the working material to be moving at a uniform velocity if heavy reductions are to be made. A particularly suitable design for an oscillating mold assembly is that disclosed in co-pending U.S. application Ser. No. 117,028, for "Oscillating Mold Casting Apparatus", having a common assignee as this application. The teachings of that application are hereby incorporated by reference.
Conventional techniques for producing brass strip are cumbersome and time consuming. Often, more than forty separate steps are required to produce a finished thin strip taking as long as forty days, including waiting time between processing machines.
It is, therefore, an object of the present invention to provide an apparatus and method for the integrated, continuous, high speed production of high quality, hot rolled metallic strip starting from a melt.
It is another object of the present invention to provide such an apparatus, compact in size, which costs much less than conventional strip-making installations.
A still further object of the present invention is to provide such an apparatus capable of producing very thin metallic strip at less cost than is possible with conventional techniques.
Yet another object of the present invention is to provide an apparatus and method for the continuous production of metal strip from a melt in which a metal rod is cast at a constant velocity and is fed to a rolling mill for conversion to strip.